


where there is a key, there is hope

by onceagainoncemore



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Blood, Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Magic, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Burn, based off my favourite childhood books ever
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:34:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25082458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onceagainoncemore/pseuds/onceagainoncemore
Summary: "But Fairyland is an old place, much older than your earth and all the other earths, and old things have strange hungers and cravings that must be satisfied. One piece is: There must be blood. The other is: Tell a lie.""I want to go home," Eddie lied softly.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 7
Kudos: 8





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> so! welcome to the most self indulgent thing i think ive ever written, ever. the book this is based off is called the girl who circumnavigated fairyland in a ship of her own making, and if you ever want to check out something so beautifully written it brings me to tears every time i read it, its totally for you!!
> 
> now, this might be the slowest burn ive ever written. richie isnt even in the story yet. we're getting to it! but for now, here's the first chapter, and a little set up. it'll speed up eventually, i''m sure!!

Once upon a time, a little boy named Eddie December Kaspbrak, grew very tired of his mother’s house, where he washed the same pink and blue teacups and gravy boats every day, slept on the same embroidered pillow, and played with the same plush no-choking-hazard stuffed bears. Because his nose was covered in red freckles and because he was born in June, and because he looked frail even with delicate crockery surrounding him, the Green Wind took pity upon him, flying to his window on the damp and hot evening of his fourteenth birthday.

“You seem an ill tempered enough child,” Green Wind remarked, adjusting his green smoking jacket, before smoothing out his green dress pants. “How would you like to come away with me and the Leopard of Small Breezes and play in the sugary grasses of Fairyland?”

“Oh, yes!” Eddie said, excited, as he disapproved heavily of teacups and embroidery and stuffed bears. 

“Jump up, little one, and do not tug too harshly on my Leopard’s fur,” The Green Wind smiled, teeth so white they were almost see through. Eddie scrambled up onto the sink, and through the open window to clamber onto the Leopard’s back. As he did so, one of his feet caught on the windowsill, and he tugged it free. His foot was released, but the prim brown leather dress shoe went tumbled down into the still-soapy sink. This was a very important moment, so we must take the time to say goodbye to the shoe. Goodbye, shoe! Eddie shall be missing you soon enough.

  
-  
  


“There are rules for Fairyland, as there are laws for your home,” The Green Wind explained as they soared above the golden fields of ripe corn and wheat. “If you trample upon those rules, you shall be removed immediately, with no return and no chance of parole… or, you shall be executed. The Marquess is very strict on these happenings.”

“Is she a terrible person?” Eddie asked.

“All little children are,” The Green Wind responded. “But she has a very nice hat.”

“Tell me the rules,” Eddie demanded firmly. He had lived his life by rules. His mother had rules for everything. How long Eddie brushed his teeth. The colours Eddie could wear outside. How fast he was allowed to drink hot chocolate. He followed these rules to the letter. He was, as his mother always told him, A Very Good Boy. At least on the outside.

"First, no iron of any type is allowed. Any bullets, knives, maces, jacks, swords, or cross necklaces you have on your person shall be confiscated and smelted. Second- alchemy is forbidden to all those except young lads and lasses who were born on a Tuesday.”

“I was born on a Tuesday,” Eddie gasps.

“It is very possible I knew that,” Green Wind winked. “Third. All air travel must be limited to licensed Bok Choys and Spring Onions, or by Leopards. If by any chance you are not in possession of any of those, you must confine yourself to the ground. Fourth, all traffic travels widdershins. Fifth, rubbish takeaways happen every second Friday, unless you live in the water. Then it is every second Monday. Sixth, all changelings must wear identifying footwear. Seven, and the most important, Little Eddie December, is to never enter the Worsted Woods, lest you be killed in a grizzly fashion or held subject to playing checkers with spinsters. Did you get all that?”

Try as he might, and with all his knowledge of memorising even the most odd of rules and regulations, Eddie could simply not hear most of these rules due to the wind blowing in his face, ruffling his blonde hair and muffling all sounds of talking. 

“Yes…” He said, unsure, but the Green Wind does not notice that hesitation.

“And last of all, consumption of fairy food enters you into a contract in which you must return every year, in accordance to the most popular moon cycle of that year,” The Green Wind finished, splaying his arms out wide.

“What does that mean?”

“It means eat anything you want, sweet summer child!” Green Wind laughed. “Eat berries and cake and as much lemonade as your little body can handle! Eat the leaves off the trees and relish in the taste!”

The wind this high up was cold and dry, and the moonlight provided no warmth. Eddie shivered, his skin covered in goosebumps, even where he was pressing his legs against the warm fur of the Leopard. The Green Wind, who was skinny and long and so bony that there was almost no body for the wind to freeze, slid off his great green jacket, who was puffing out little huffs of sweet smelling smoke, and wrapped it around Eddie’s shoulders. When Eddie pulled his arms through the jacket, and frowned at how long the sleeves were, the jacket puffed itself up like a pufferfish, and when it came back down, it fit Eddie perfectly.

This jacket was a very proud jacket- something it shared with the Green Wind. Its purpose was to make its wearer happy, and once Eddie’s shock from the resizing calmed down, the jacket produced a shiny brooch, a golden key, just to impress the little boy. Eddie strokes the key, and the jacket lets out a happy cloud of smoke.

“We are almost at the end of the earth,” Green Wind said, even though Eddie knew there was no such thing as the end of the earth. The earth was a round ball, not unlike basketballs - of which, Eddie had never touched- and certainly did not have an end. “Now, it is much more complicated, this process, but you are young and your mind is small and immature like a cute baby green tomato. So I will explain this simply.

“The earth is like a chain link, Eddie December. We must pry this link open so we may go onto another- of which I am talking about Fairyland- and then close that link so no one else falls through a gap,” Green Wind said, as if what he was saying made sense. “Easy, right? You seem like a smart enough boy.”

“I am very smart,” Eddie said, and stuck his chin out. Eddie, not by his own fault but rather his mother’s, a woman who believes her child exists above everyone else, had not grown out of his childhood superiority. He is, deep in his core, still a child, even if the teachers at school called him  _ young man. _

“And here is the link we must break,” Green Wind said, and the Leopard dipped her head down, and the three of them landed on what appeared to be glass overtop of the blue ocean. There were two men standing there, their eyes the same colour as the water beneath their feet. “Now, Eddie, there is a puzzle you must complete.”

“Who are they?” Eddie whispered.

“Latitude and Longitude,” Green Wind said, and Eddie bowed respectfully. Green Wind laughed, but bowed as well, amused. Latitude yawned, his tongue the colour of old maps, and Longitude sighed. “Did you expect them to talk? They’re celebrities! They’re very private.”

“You said there was a puzzle,” Eddie said. Eddie liked to pretend he liked puzzles. They were one of the only toys his mother bought him that weren’t soft stuffed bears. In truth, he found them boring and useless, but it was better than letting his brain rot.

“When you do a puzzle, Christmas-child,” Green Wind said. “How do you solve it?”

“Well…” Eddie said. “You start from the corners, and then make a frame, then fill in the middle.”

“Do you know how many winds there are historically?” Green Wind asked, and smiled softly when Eddie shook his head no. “Four: Green, Red, Black and Gold. Of course, those are rough family designations, and there is also Silver and Blue- but they’ve made trouble off the coast of Tunisia and have had to go to bed without their supper and cocoa. So as it stands, us Winds are the corners today. And these two are the edges, and you, Eddie December, are the middle.”

“I don’t understand,” Eddie said.

“All in the words, dear boy. One piece is a child hopping widdershins on one foot, nine revolutions. One is to wear something that is not yours, but freely given. One is to clap a hand over one eye. One is to give something up of your own. One is to have a feline in attendance.”

“That’s easy!”

“Mostly easy. But Fairyland is an old place, much older than your earth and all the other earths, and old things have strange hungers and cravings that must be satisfied. One piece is: There must be blood. The other is: Tell a lie.”

Eddie swallowed heavily, and tried to remember it all. He places a hand over one of his eyes, and hopped, on his bare foot, in a circle in a direction he fervently hoped was widdershins. His smoking jacket spun out in the light breeze, catching the sun and shining like a craving of green emerald. When he stopped, he unpinned the golden key brooch, and pricked his finger. He yelped- it was much sharper than expected, and he dropped the key to the ground. And then he looked at the two figures, and opened his mouth to talk.

“I want to go home,” Eddie lied softly.

Nothing happened for a moment, and Eddie felt overwhelmed with the sadness and disappointed that ran through his veins. And then the two men started to move, twisting and bending their limbs. Their faces stretched to be near each other, and then with a sigh from both of them - this one happy, not bored- they kissed, and an opening, just big enough for a Leopard and a little boy to go through opened.

“Well done,” Green Wind said, and helped lift Eddie back onto the Leopard’s saddle. “I cannot follow. Remember the rules.”

And the Leopard soars through the hole before Eddie can ask what the rules were once more.

And odd things happen when you leave your world on the back of a Leopard. The Green Wind did not see this, as he was soaring away, off to cause more mischief, but Latitude and Longitude saw. They did not care. And we should not see either, as that would be cheating.

But fairies do love their cheating, so we shall cheat as well. 

So as Eddie and the Leopard left through the puzzle, the key rose up and swooped in behind them, almost as quiet as pure distilled silence itself.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One step.
> 
> Two steps.
> 
> And our dear Eddie December Kaspbrak fell through the floor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dont you worry!! we get some actual characters soon enough. this is an extremely eddie focused fic, which i didnt even realise until i actually started writing it!! i hope you're all enjoying this so far!

Now Eddie’s Earth, our Earth, was very old. She had been around longer than most Earths- but not Fairyland, of course, but had certainly progressed faster than Fairyland- and like most old women, collected stand-ins for her memory. Memory was something you always lost at old age, and at Earth’s age, she has forgotten most things.

So she collected paintings and old armour and anything else that may, one day, be useful once more. 

The area Eddie had landed in was one of Earth’s storerooms. This storeroom was a remembrance to a particular era of her children- the one of explosion of new art and new lifestyles, the walls covered in paintings from ceiling to ground. Some pieces were covered up with marble white statues, or furniture so dusty it made Eddie sneeze.

Eddie slid off the Leopard’s back, kept his hand on her neck, and shuffled into the line of people, seemingly waiting for something ahead. The line was slow and snail-like, like the queues in Disneyland or in a DMV. Eddie had been to neither of those, but he knew roughly what they were like. There were people taller than Eddie by feet upon feet, and people shorter than him, so small Eddie could step on them. The Leopard purred, and they moved forward slowly. They arrived at the front of the line after what felt to be a dizzying amount of time, so long Eddie felt dead on his feet, and he had to look up at the ticket booth to see the woman dealing out what Eddie assumed to be tickets.

She had rough grey skin, like she had been carved from a not particularly good looking rock. Her eyes were orange but still pale and rock-like, and when she leaned over the counter to peer at Eddie, he gripped tight onto the Leopard’s fur. She growled.

“Where’s your other shoe?” She asked. 

“Home,” Eddie said. “I think.”

She leaned back in her chair, and hummed, thinking. It was hard for Eddie to imagine there was a brain for thinking underneath her rocky skin.

“First time?” She said, and brought out a heavy brass box.

“Yes,” Eddie said, assuming she was talking about going to Fairyland. She wasn’t, of course, but that is information that Eddie does not need to know, and neither do we.

“I like you,” She decided. She flipped open the box, and dragged her fingers through the orange goop inside. “Fairy dust. Lets you see fairy gold and other fun little fairy things.”

Eddie knew well enough that fairy gold was never real gold at all, and that substance was obviously slime and not dust at all, but the lady slung it into his eyes before he can protest. It burnt, stinging, and Eddie's vision swum a hazy honey yellow when he tried to look back up at the woman.

“Have fun,” The lady said, and slammed something down onto the table in front of her. Eddie narrowed his eyes, trying to look. He stumbled, hands out for the Leopard, but she’d disappeared. 

One step.

Two steps.

And our dear Eddie December Kaspbrak fell through the floor.

  
-

In a child’s mind, this fall took an extremely long time. Long enough for Eddie to begin to reconsider coming to Fairyland- which was ridiculous, of course. He was already there. Nothing to do about it now- but in an adult’s mind, one with a slightly better grasp on the mutual illusion known as  _ time _ , the fall took nothing more than a few seconds. 

A few very fake seconds- as Fairyland likes time just about as much as it likes rules, AKA not at all- and Eddie had splashed deep into a navy ocean, choppy waves threatening to steal his breath and birds cawing ahead, as if they had found a good meal.

Eddie would not be a good meal, however. Not nearly enough meat.

Eddie had also never taken swimming lessons. He was moving to the shore, in a fashion that was using more energy than fighting drowning would ever be, but his jacket was so puffed out he was floating like a rotten egg. The birds quieten. They don’t want to be mistaken for cheering on the little boy’s horrific swimming technique.

Somehow, after both a child’s eternity and an adult’s, Eddie reached the beach shore. As he tried to stand, he slipped, slamming his delicate face against the ground. It’s against something hard and sharp, and Eddie’s face throbbed, and when he pulled away, there was blood streaming down his face.  _ There must be blood,  _ he thought, as he wiped it away with his sleeve.

He’d tripped onto what appeared to be a gold goblet. He got up slowly, and started walking across the beach. There was no sand, no stones, no rockpools. Just golden objects and coins, bejewelled plates and element-polished swords stabbed into the ground. Eddie’s bare foot was much better at walking along this beach, able to grip with his little toes, but he didn’t dare take the other off, in case he bled once more.

To help his walking, he dug out a golden stick. The very top, where Eddie used it as a hand-hold, was covered in small precious stones, and shone brightly as Eddie touched it. 

He reached the top of the beach, and sighed. The bottom of his bare foot was not bleeding, but it felt bruised and sore, and the cut on his face had yet to stop throbbing. When he looks back down, all the gold is gone. 

“Fairy gold,” He murmurs. Somehow, the stick- a sceptre, maybe- was still gold and jewelled, but everything else had turned into algae-green slippery rocks and even the sand was a grey instead of yellow. He drops the stick, just to see if it would turn to wood. It does not. It stays shiny and gold, although now, it was covered in wet dirt. He tries to brush it off when he picks it back off, but all that does is get his hands dirty.

He wiped the dirt onto the jacket- which is not amused at all, trying to puff itself up so it would dry faster, letting out an annoyed wheeze when Eddie rubs the dirt onto it- and began to trek up further along the beach. He eventually reached dry land, and he stuck his chin up into the gentle breeze, breathing in the new air. It smelt like smoke, salty sand, and seaweed. Eddie wrinkled his nose, as the fussy boy he was, he didn’t like the scents of outdoors. But it was better than the smell of his mother’s choking perfume, so he did not voice those complaints aloud.

There’s a signpost up ahead, and Eddie rushed to it, thankful. It was always good to try and get a sense of where you were, and Eddie spent all of his life living under directions.

The first waymark reads  _ To Lose Your Life,  _ the beaten first path facing off to the east, winding up and up a hill, up to a cliff face, overlooking the ocean Eddie had just been swimming in. The cliff face is sharp and is so very high up. You would not survive if you fell off. Not even with a floating jacket like Eddie’s.

The second read  _ To Lose Your Mind _ , and the path is made from wood pressed into the ground, and leads in the opposite direction to the first waymark, off into a dark forest. The sun does not pass through the canopy at all, leaving nothing but shadows and gleaming red eyes watching Eddie.

The third,  _ To Lose Your Spirit, _ faces back towards the beach. This path is made from stone, steps leading back down into the water. The water is darker, choppier where the stairs are.

And the very last,  _ To Lose Your Heart,  _ is the only clear path. It’s a cobblestone path leading away from the beach entirely, and the trees that offer shade still let sunlight through, unlike the second path.

Now, as adults, none of these options sound appealing. But to a child?

Eddie started walking along the  _ To Lose Your Heart.  _ All other options were horrible. He couldn’t lose his life- he’d just gotten here! If he lost his mind, he’d never be able to experience anything ever again, and if he lost his spirit, he wouldn’t be able to find the motivation to do what he wants.

I can hear you. You’re screaming  _ No! Not that way! No, child, please! Anything but that path!  _ But Eddie is a child, and children do not have their hearts grown in fully yet. It’s why they can climb trees too tall and rebel against rules. Children are inherently Heartless, and Eddie is no different. He is old enough that his heart fluctuates, some days too big for his little body and some days like today, where there is nothing beating in his chest at all.

You, dear reader, know what it feels like to lose your heart. Eddie does not.

He will find out soon enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [come chat to me here. i have a lot of ideas and no one to yell at.](https://himbotozier.tumblr.com/)

**Author's Note:**

> [come join me over on tumblr. i swear i don't bite.](https://himbotozier.tumblr.com/)


End file.
